


"Later, I will grieve."

by TakingFlight48



Series: Moments of Written Musings [8]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: 31 Days of Writing Challenge, 3rd War, Draco is super amazing too but just a minor character, End of a battle, F/M, Gen, Guerilla Tactics, Harry - bless him says 4 words before he croaks, Hermione is a BAMF, No romantic-ness, Prompt - Major Character Death, Theodore Nott is the bad guy, This was horrible to write haha, semi-battle scene, short snippet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-29
Updated: 2020-10-29
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:54:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27255271
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TakingFlight48/pseuds/TakingFlight48
Summary: Even as her worry over the whereabouts and success of her husbands rattled her calm, Hermione was finally able to beat and bind the latest threat to the Wizarding World.  However, on his knees, struggling against the magic of her binding ropes, Theodore Nott issued a final soul-splitting curse.  One that would not only devastate the still healing Wizarding World, but ensure that Hermione Malfoy-Potter, did everything in her power as Director of the MLE, to see him rot.
Relationships: Harry Potter/Hermione Granger/Draco Malfoy
Series: Moments of Written Musings [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1946668
Comments: 3
Kudos: 11
Collections: 31 Days of Writing Challenge - Fall 2020





	"Later, I will grieve."

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the October 7th Prompt - Major Character Death.  
> Part of 31 Days of Writing Challenge. 
> 
> Enjoy ☮ ✌

“Bombarda!” she grit out, as she sprinted across the alley before taking cover behind a newly collapsed wall. 

The ground shook beneath her, the air around her crisp with the metallic taste of expelled magic and the noises of battle. The noises that were rocketing through her already shaking form like a crescendo that just wouldn’t reach its peak. 

Her breath was prancing out of her as quickly as the beating of her heart, and with a quick close of her eyes, she forced herself onto her feet. Crouched low, Hermione shifted against the wall until she was but a foot away from seeing what lay behind her. 

Shivering as her disillusionment charm trailed over her form, she chanced a look. She had yet to see Harry or Draco, her heart clenching as this knowledge crept into the forefront of her mind and she slammed her shields down unwilling to consider what that could mean. Not yet. Not until this was over. 

“Fuck,” she dropped onto her side, just managing to miss a wayward Avada and realizing how lethal these spells were turning now. She gave herself one moment more to normalise her breathing, to picture the endless shelves of books reminiscent of the ones at Malfoy Manor. The same library she had devoured for months after she moved in with Draco and before this third war began. 

Her eyes flashed gold when she opened them again, and she sprinted into the fray blocking offensive spells until her disillusionment no longer mattered. In between her shields and her offensive spells, she dropped her charm so the man she was parrying with knew who would be the one to take him down. 

“You learned nothing from 7 years ago, you coward!” she shouted as another green light sped past her. As she twirled to the left, she brought her right hand up and back down, adding more damage to his already bloody side with a deep cutting hex as her left hand held up a protective shield. 

“You may have married into two old families, but you will never be one of us. I put up with you for too long. Smiling while Draco muddied his name and gritting my teeth as the Boy-Who-Lived-” his speech was cut short, as her ‘Avis’ pierced through his shield and her blackbirds of prey began to claw at every open wound meticulously. 

“The Wizarding World deserves to be the best. Deserves to rise above the rest. And you're going to ruin us all with your technology and bloody science,” he choked out as she twisted her wand to the left a quarter turn and her ravens shifted into thick, coiling rope. 

“You used me. You used my husbands. You came from your trip to America a different man, Theodore Nott, and I am through with who you have become.”

With a final silent spell, the rope wrapped lethally around his neck, shifting around his legs and forcing her one time friend to his knees. Her face was blank as her rope began its final challenge to secure his hands behind his back. 

The laugh he choked out had her skin puckering and her left hand twitching to do more than take him back to the Ministry alive and relatively well. She grit her teeth until teak wood and crisp apples enveloped, her moments before Draco’s firm hands found purchase on her hips. 

“Harry?” she murmured in relief at knowing at least one-third of her family was still alive. 

“Here!” her shoulders relaxed at Harry’s voice, “I’m here my love. We are all oka-” 

“Avada Kedavra!” As the spell shot out of Nott’s wand moments before he lost the battle to her magic, Hermione felt the world slow. 

She felt Draco’s thick hands shift behind her as he attempted to use her body as leverage to get to Harry faster than she could. Her eyes connected with Harry’s a moment before his face froze. Everything around them stilled as her oldest magical friend, The Boy Who survived more times than one should, and her husband of five years slowly fell to the charred, debris-laden battleground. 

“You bastard!” She screamed as Nott laughed to her right and she slid onto her knees by Harry’s head. Once vibrant green eyes dull and void of life, staring straight ahead as her mouth dropped open in a soundless wail of pain. Draco thumped next to her, hands shaking over Harry’s cheek as he took in their dead third. 

Mouth opening and closing, words escaping them both as they shook beside him and like a rubber band, they were snapped back to the present by the sadistic chuckle of the culprit next to them. 

“How does it feel, Princess?” he taunted as her eyes flashed golden once again, and she made to stand. 

“Awww, don’t look at me like that. Now we are even. You lot killed my wife,” he looked much too smug for a man now wandless, bound, and kneeling before her now standing form. 

She heard Draco shift behind her, felt his indecision to join her or stay by Harry’s side as she made to move towards Theo. Her wand hand rose up, “I hate you!” She screamed at his words, “We didn’t kill her. We would never. Your best friend, Marcus Flint,” she spat as the furious witch stepped closer to him, wand-point landing directly between his eyes, “drugged, raped, and left her for dead. He tried to murder her, but you were too blind to see the facts.” 

Her normally warm eyes, glinted like shards of amber ice, her body shaking but her voice steady. “If it hadn't been for the man you just ki-” Hermione stuttered, wand hand jittering violently as her vinewood pressed a deep indent into his skin. 

Trying again she continued, “The man you just took away from us, if not for him your wife would be dead. You left us, Theo. You left us, went to America as if we couldn’t understand your grief, and came back with a man we all thought dead only to begin this asinine ‘war’,” she threw her left hand up to imitate quotes, “for a woman who we have been keeping safe from you and those you chose to align yourself with! Pansy is my best friend, and you let him TOUCH HER. She’s alive, she’s safe and Harry,” Hermione sobbed, unable to hold onto the facade of calm at that moment. “No! Avad-”

Draco leapt into her, arm looping around her waist, the other coming to rest gently above her wand hand, “Lioness. Not like this.” He murmured against her ear, his voice the dead chill he had perfected during the second war. 

“He wouldn’t want you to sully your hands, your conscience, your soul, on someone like him,” he slowly shifted her wand hand down, it’s tip dragging between Theo’s eyes. 

“Yes,  _ Lioness _ , run along and-”

“You’ve lost - everything!” Hermione let Draco pry her hands off her wand, but he didn’t stop her from bringing herself nose to nose with the murderer. “I am not sparing your life, Theodore Nott. You have started a war, innocent blood was already on your hands, but now the life of Britain's most beloved war hero joins your count. We will see you rotting, soulless, in Azkaban. So this is simply Draco’s selfish need to keep me as whole as possible now that a third of my heart, our heart, has been robbed from us.”

Theo’s eyes had widened as she concluded her speech in the same deadly chill Draco’s held. She glared at him a moment longer before spitting on the ground and with a dangerous smirk brought the heel of her steel-toed boot down. The snap of wood underfoot garnered the first pained reaction from her one-time friend. 

“Ooops,” she whispered, brow raised as she stepped back, motioned for Seamus to take him straight to Azkaban and she turned into Draco’s embrace. Theo screamed that they couldn’t take him there without a trial as Draco burrowed his face into her crown. 

Her body shook once as she bit down hard on her inner cheek before breathing out and looking up into Draco’s equally occluded eyes. 

“Can you - can you take him home while I sort out this mess, Dragon?” she murmured, her hand coming up to trace the lone tear track amongst the layer of grime against his porcelain skin. 

He stood stock-still, unmoving as he searched her eyes until movement behind her forced his gaze over her shoulder. 

“Madame Director?” Kingsley’s deep voice rumbled apologetically, “Shall we?”

With a final gasping breath rattling through her lungs, she furrowed her brows, rose on her toes to place a soft kiss against Draco’s protesting lips and turned to finish this six-month gorilla warfare on an almost peaceful Wizarding Britain. 

“Later,” she whispered over her shoulder as Draco watched her walk away before they both glanced down on their now dead spouse. “Later, I will grieve.”

**Author's Note:**

> Let me tell you - I rewrote this 4 times, changing who would die and who the pairings were. I am SHIT at angst like this. Truly. I AM WEAK. 
> 
> Thanks for getting to the end and I hope you enjoyed this small little trip into sadness and my first semi-active battle/duel scene. :D
> 
> Anyway - please leave love in words or kudos as they motivate and uplift. 
> 
> Should you disagree with the words displayed above, ConCrit is appreciated/preferred. ॐ


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